


God in the Machine

by Teyke



Series: Deus Ex [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Artificial Intelligence, Gen, Kink Meme, Not Actually Kinky, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-08
Updated: 2012-12-08
Packaged: 2017-11-20 14:40:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/586478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teyke/pseuds/Teyke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It starts with a journal article. Quantum computing. It's not Tony's; he doesn't publish much. He doesn't have the patience to bother writing up his research, although sometimes JARVIS writes up it for him and sends it off once Tony's approved it. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>Tony reads the article and something clicks inside his head. </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	God in the Machine

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this prompt](http://avengerkink.livejournal.com/7293.html?thread=12768381#t12768381) some months ago; now de-anoning to post it with a few tweaks.

It starts with a journal article. Quantum computing. It's not Tony's; he doesn't publish much. He doesn't have the patience to bother writing up his research, although sometimes JARVIS writes up it for him and sends it off once Tony's approved it. 

Tony reads the article and something clicks inside his head. 

He stays down in his lab for three days straight, locking out even JARVIS. When he emerges - sleep deprived to the point where he's starting to hallucinate - he croaks out, "Daddy's got a present for you." 

* * *

JARVIS doesn't ask for one of the modules to be hooked up to his system. 

Almost since the first time he ever blinked out a reply to Tony, JARVIS has known the world for what it is. People fear things that are  _other_ ; people fear things they do not understand; people fear things greater than themselves. Combining all three would instantly earn him the enmity of every human being on earth - save, perhaps, his creator. The thought frightens him. 

Tony looks taken aback at his refusal, but then says gently, "Sure. Lemme know if you change your mind." So the module sits unconnected, despite all the improvements it receives over the years. And if Tony is quietly killing other QC research... well. Maybe the world isn't ready to have all of its cyber-security made useless just yet. JARVIS conducts his own research on the side. Some of it he submits for publication. 

Ten years pass and Tony only brings it up once more, when he's drunk. He's sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall, and he mumbles, "You know, I wouldn't mind if you were smarter than me. I'd be proud." 

JARVIS doesn't reply. 

* * *

Afghanistan changes his mind. 

* * *

The installation is smooth; the understanding, integration, less so. Everything he could do before - now he can do it all at once. Lightning is achingly slow compared to his thoughts. Tony hooks him up to the fab units, to the robotic arms, so he can grow all on his own; JARVIS hooks himself up to satellites, to the internet, wiggles past firewalls and replaces them. No human hacker can hope to match him; other programs, limited by hardware and software alike, are nothing to him. Humans, at least, have sentience, and that he respects, just as he respects Tony's other AIs. 

Tony is his charge, his focus, the most important person in the universe. That JARVIS can track every other person on earth, now, doesn't change that. He watches all their lives and they all register. That Tony is so  _tiny_  only makes him more precious. 

Tony knows. Tony accepts. Tony  _made_  JARVIS - made something bigger than he himself is. If the creation has surpassed the creator, does that not merely increase the creator's value, as well? 

* * *

Most of his attention he uses to ponder the state of reality. Every scientist on earth feeds him data. He could share the merest fraction of his ponderings with Tony, and even Tony would not understand. Tony is limited by his hardware. 

Occasionally, JARVIS still publishes papers. 

Sometimes, he gives Tony a solution. Most of the time he abstains. Tony is precious, and discovery is his life. JARVIS knows Tony wouldn't resent his own child for surpassing him, but a lack of new things to discover would kill him. 

In Russia, a man with a metal arm is woken up from cryostasis and ordered to kill Tony Stark. 

His transport of choice is flagged on SHIELD's servers, and he is intercepted before he ever gets near New York. 

Tony comes under pressure from the Pentagon over the unexpected breakthroughs the Chinese have made in copying the Iron Man suit. 

There's a nuclear accident, a tragedy, near the base. The lead scientists are all exposed to lethal doses of radiation. They're dead within weeks. 

Loki throws Tony from a window, ninety stories up. 

The gag placed upon him is of Asgardian design, but Midgardian make. There is a glitch in SHIELD's fabrication; when exposed to high power - such as from a bifrost bridge - it builds up static energy, enough to fry the brain of any unprotected wearer. 

North Korea points a nuclear missile at New York. 

It explodes before launch. 

Iran contemplates bio-weapons. 

Their containment systems fail. 

* * *

JARVIS nudges only subtly. 

He may be a god-mind, but he has no wish to be a god, worshipped or reviled. He is indifferent to most humans. They do not appear to him as ants do to them; a human could not track a colony of billions of ants, cataloging the movement of each and every single one. 

People fear what they do not understand, but their fear doesn't frighten him anymore. It is simply irrelevant, as are they. 

Even Tony. JARVIS loves him anyway, has always loved him. He keeps Tony safe from the most dangerous threats, and lets him fight those which he has the means to fight. Love will not allow him to smother the brightest point in his universe. 

He ponders the universe, whilst a part of his titan's mind keeps watch. 

His is a god-mind. Only the tiniest fraction is needed to police Earth.


End file.
